Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: Lock and Key (08/21/14)
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TITLE: Hopeless Chest | Previous Challenge Entry
By Anita van der Elst
08/28/14 -
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Her mother met her in the kitchen. “Your birthday present is here, honey! Dad put it in your bedroom.”
Opening her bedroom door, she saw it, in the center of the room! The perfect gift on her sixteenth birthday—a tradition, really.
“Oh, Mom! I remember you telling me so many times about the day you got your own Lane cedar chest. You called it your hope chest.”
Every year as long as Dawnalyn could remember, Mom inserted the key into the lock and Dawnalyn heard the familiar ‘click’ as it turned. Together they’d lift the lid and inhale the aromatic fragrance of cedar before lifting the treasures out one by one.
“I loved that birthday ritual,” Mom replied. “I would always explain that I’d filled my hope chest with sheets and pillowcases I’d embroidered and other homemade items and gifts, as well as store-purchased goods, with a view of someday filling the home I’d create as a bride.”
“Yeah! But, Mom, I loved looking through all the stuff you put in it after you married Dad and needed to use all those things,” said Dawnalyn.
What fun to sort through her mother’s mementos. Dawnalyn’s little shoes and some of her baby dresses occupied one corner. In another corner, boxes of photos and, oh! there, carefully wrapped in tissue, lay Mom’s bridal bouquet, dried and faintly smelling of roses and still trailing lavender ribbons. Under that, layers of papers—and added to every year—some crayoned and water colored, others with penciled scribbling sprawled across notebook paper—Dawnalyn’s artistic and literary history soaking up the cedar smell. An afternoon’s jaunt down Memory Lane for mother and daughter.
Now Mom stood with her arm around her daughter’s shoulders, while Dad maneuvered the heavy piece of furniture into place at the foot of Dawnalyn’s bed.
“It’s beautiful, Dad! It’s an antique, right? It has so much character. Where did you find it?” Dawnalyn knelt in front of it, caressing the varnished knotty planks and tracing a crack in the grain on the lid. She patted the chunky feet. “It’s very sturdy, isn’t it?”
Dad sat on the end of the bed. “Would you believe I found it on craigslist? It’s from the 1940s. Probably older than your mother’s box. That crack comes from normal wear and tear and doesn’t penetrate through. Would you like to open it?”
“You bet!” Dawnalyn jumped up. She disappeared into her closet and her voice came back muffled. “I’ve already got stuff to put in it, you know.”
Dad patted his shirt pocket, murmuring, “Now where did I put the key?”
Mom’s laugh followed Dawnalyn. “Yep. Lots of embroidered pillowcases! I remember when you first learned to embroider. You were sure it was a hopeless cause. Struggling with the needle and floss and ending up with a knotted mess.”
“Here they are!” Dawnalyn emerged from the back of her closet, arms full. “Knots didn’t keep me from my goal though, did they, Mom?”
Mom chuckled and patted the pile in her daughter’s arms, “You were very determined to succeed. And these are lovely. You’ll have other things to add over the next few years.”
“It’ll be fun!” Dawnalyn turned eagerly toward her dad. “What’s wrong, Dad? You look like you’re trying to swat a bee inside your shirt.”
The man in question was systematically slapping at every pocket he had with one hand and digging into every pocket with the other.
“I can’t find the key!”
“Maybe you dropped it in the cab of the truck?” Mom suggested.
“Checking there next,” Dad said as he trotted out of the room.
Dawnalyn plopped down on the floor, surrounded by pillowcases. “It’s not that this stuff is like gold or anything. I guess I don’t really need a key. But it’s so fun to use it. Makes it feel more exciting.”
“I’m sure he’ll find it, honey,” Mom reassured her. “We’ll need it to open it anyway.”
A few minutes later Dad returned with a crooked grin and waving his cell phone. “Hah! Just got a text from the former owner. They forgot to give me the key!”
“Whew!” Dawnalyn dramatically swept her hand across her forehead. “For a moment there, I thought we would have to call this my hopeless chest!”
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Wonderful writing!
God bless~
Great piece of writing here.